Capplebarrow
Capplebarrow at 513m (1,682ft) is an Outlying Fell above the Longsleddale valley on the eastern fringe of the Lake District, giving views across Longsleddale and east towards the Pennines. Wainwright included it in his Outlying Fells guide. A moorland fell in pleasant, remote country.
Summit conditions on Capplebarrow
On the summit on Tuesday 27 October: 12° to 6°C, gusts to 53 mph, 9.0 mm of rain forecast over the whole day, midnight to midnight.
The forecast figures are Open-Meteo’s, worked out for the summit’s height. How we check →
Routes up Capplebarrow
Hand-mapped, with GPX to download — full maps further down.
Distance and climb are measured from the route’s GPX track, and the time from them by Naismith’s rule; the route page says what each grade rests on. How we check →
How hard is Capplebarrow?
The shortest way up we hold is Harrop Pike & Ancrow Brow - Birketts — 20.03 km, 660 m of ascent, ~5–7 h. On our scale its hardest axes are distance and steepness — Severe.
All axes: length: Severe · steepness: Severe · navigation: Hard · terrain: Not assessed · exposure: Not assessed.
These are the route page’s grades, set by the rules on how we grade: length and steepness measured from its GPX track, the others set on the ground, judged from the map or estimated from OpenStreetMap. The route page says which. How we check →
Conditions and 7-day summit forecast
Modelled for the 513 m summit (Open-Meteo). Check the Met Office mountain forecast and MWIS before you set off.
Full 7-day forecast
Taken 27 October 2026, 20:59 UTC; the live forecast replaces it when it loads. Weather data by Open-Meteo.com (opens in new tab)
Parking & buses for Capplebarrow
Parking
Route starts first, then the car parks nearest the summit, which are not always a way up.
Positions are approximate.
Vehicles are left at their owner’s risk: we list places people park and cannot vouch for any of them. Take valuables with you and leave nothing on show.
Buses
The nearest bus stop we hold is the 6 and 555 stop at Staveley, outside Abbey Square, 8.5 km of walking from the start — no bus route we hold serves it.
Getting there across the Lake District: Buses · Parking map · By train · By boat
Hazards on Capplebarrow
Notes from a planned route, not walked: Harrop Pike & Ancrow Brow - Birketts
- The Bannisdale watershed section holds a 2 km+ pathless stretch of tussock and peat hag — featureless in mist and slow in any weather. The plotted line there is a bearing, not a path.
If you need to get off (the leg from Swinklebank Crag): Retreat: Keep pushing south. Bailing directly west off the ridge into Longsleddale here is possible in an absolute emergency, but the slopes are incredibly steep and choked with bracken.
Quoted from the route page of a planned route, drawn from the map and not yet walked: its warnings and the note for the leg that reaches Capplebarrow.
We have not written a hazard card for this fell yet, and that is not a sign that it is low-hazard. Read the warnings on the route pages that climb it, check the forecast, carry a map and compass, and turn back in cloud if the ground is not what you expected. The National Park Authority’s What to pack page, AdventureSmart’s hill walking kit list and Mountain Rescue England and Wales’s safety page are linked from our what to carry guide.
If you need Mountain Rescue
Dial 999 or 112 and ask for the Police, then Mountain Rescue.
Before you call, have ready: where you are (a grid reference if you can – the OS Locate app shows yours on your phone), what has happened, how many of you there are, and your mobile number.
Then stay where you are until the rescue team contacts you.
If you cannot make a voice call because of a hearing or speech impairment, emergency SMS works only if you have registered first: text “register” to 999.
From Mountain Rescue England and Wales’s guidance on calling them out (opens in new tab) (read 26 October 2026).
Map, GPX and nearby Birketts
Skip mapFree mapping: OpenTopoMap / OpenStreetMap, with SRTM elevation data (switch layers top-right).
Parking, toilets and buses: Parking & buses ↑.
Birketts within 3 km of Capplebarrow
These Birkett tops are not Wainwright summits. Distances are straight lines: check the ground and access on a map before adding one.
Routes over Capplebarrow
Download GPX Planned route · not yet walked
Every line here is a guide, not a guarantee — conditions change. Navigate for yourself and carry a map and compass. How to use this guide.
On the hill: terrain and water on Capplebarrow
Terrain & access
A near-path top (about 513 m): a mapped path comes within about 80 m of the summit. We have not checked a way from it to the top: the figures here are measured along a straight line on a terrain model, not a route. That line climbs about 0 m. The direct line crosses 1 fence.
Computed from open data, not walked — pathless ground needs confident navigation, and mapped paths, barriers and access boundaries can be incomplete. Data © OpenStreetMap contributors (via Overpass); Natural England CRoW Access Land; DoBIH v18.4 (CC BY 4.0); Copernicus GLO-30. See the terrain & access report for how this is worked out across all 144 fells.
Access on Capplebarrow
Access: summit and direct approach lie within mapped open-access land (CRoW). The usual access-land conditions apply.
Walls & fences: the approach crosses a fence. No stile or gate is mapped within 150 m of the crossing — that’s a statement about the map, not the fence, which may well have one. Expect to walk the fence to find a crossing rather than climbing it, and turn back if you find none: fences are working boundaries and take real damage from climbers.
Local restrictions can close open-access areas temporarily — check the official open-access information (opens in new tab) before travelling.
How we worked out the access
Summit and approach positions are tested against Natural England’s CRoW Act 2000 access layer; rights of way and wall or fence detail come from OpenStreetMap. Both are open datasets with known gaps — in our own survey only 4 of 26 wall and fence crossings had a stile or gate mapped within 150 m — so absence of a mapped feature never means absence of a real one. Nothing here is field-verified unless marked, and none of it is legal advice. How we checked 377 fells.
Access land: © Natural England copyright. Contains Ordnance Survey data © Crown copyright and database right 2026.
About Capplebarrow
Classifications & hill data
Is Capplebarrow a Wainwright?
Capplebarrow is one of Wainwright's Outlying Fells, not one of the 214 in the Pictorial Guides. It is also on the Birkett list and the Synge list.
Selected lists
This is the summit’s grid reference. If you call from anywhere else, give your own position, not this one.
The summit is also a Birkett.
Lists, height and summit position from the Database of British and Irish Hills; the feet are converted from its metres and the grid reference from that position. How we check →
Places to stay near this fell
We have not verified an independent place near this fell — these are the chains and charities that serve it.
- Mosedale Cottage (opens in new tab) hutabout 4.0 km
We have not stayed at any of them. We take no bookings or affiliate fees. Distances are straight lines from each route start, never walking times. Properties found via OpenStreetMap (opens in new tab).